If you’re thinking of starting your own business you’ve come to the right place. Whether you have run a business before, just left school or retired these tips will help you get your start-up up and running.
- Get a mentor
No one is born an expert in everything and there are lots of different parts of running a business that you may not know about. Online advertising? Upselling your products? Customer retention? Every successful entrepreneur has made lots of mistakes and they’re often prepared to help share their experience. Try networking events at your local Chamber of Commerce or Meetup.com to get started.
- Understand your audience
Lots of research is imperative to your new business being a success. If you want to open a café, sit in other café’s and ask customers what they like and dislike about the experience, if you’ve not worked in a café before try to get a part time job in one where you can learn the ‘behind the scenes’ aspect of the job, including things like ordering stock and health and safety.
- Make sure you get paid on time
Don’t feel uneasy about setting strict payment timescales and enforcing them. New businesses have been known to fail purely because of late payers, until you have a steady stream of income you may be reliant on customers paying on time to keep afloat. Software like KashFlow has ‘pay now’ buttons on invoices and sends automated reminders to those who are at the end of their notice period, making late payers a thing of the past.
- Make customers your number 1 priority
Your customers are your business, they’re the ones who pay your bills and spread word about your product/services. If you have a physical location such a shop it should be as easy to get to as possible for your customers or if you’re online based your website should be easy to navigate – always think of the customer journey. Remember to always ask your customers for feedback – good or bad is equally useful for shaping the future of your business.
- Pick the right name
Your name will reflect your business and shouldn’t confuse customers about the nature of your business. We Buy Any Car for example makes it clear what the business does in the name, the same as Rental Cars. There are some great lists of hair salons online who have taken quirky inspiration with their names such as ‘Live and let dye’ and ‘By the blade’ although these names might be best if you don’t need to consider online marketing and SEO!
Hopefully this will have helped you come up with some ideas for starting your own business. It’s important to get a real grip of your finances straight away and bookkeeping software like KashFlow can help – try free for 14 days today
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